


Kara's Recovery

by jollywriter



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Some angst, happy endings, lots of fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-25
Updated: 2017-05-25
Packaged: 2018-11-04 18:07:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10996161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jollywriter/pseuds/jollywriter
Summary: Kara Danvers leaves DEO after a very hard night with only one thing on her mind; seeing her girlfriend again.





	Kara's Recovery

**Author's Note:**

> I just love these two okay? and Domestic Karlena makes my life. 
> 
> hit me with prompts and comments @thejollywriter on Tumblr!!!!!!!

Kara was so exhausted she couldn’t fly home. Alex drove her. It was a weird trip, too. Usually it’s Kara looking after Alex after a fight. Alex with the butterfly stitches and the braces and the pain killers.

But Kara’s enemies were evolving. And part of that evolution included weapons that could cut her skin. For the first time since Kara came out as Supergirl and began working with the DEO, there needed to be resources devoted to repairing and maintaining Kara’s uniform.

Not that Kara minded. It was just something she didn’t need to worry about.

So, on the ride home with Alex, she just sat there and ached. Her body was painfully battered. Breathing was hard, too, since her ribs were cracked.

She didn’t like feeling so fragile.

“So,” Alex said, sitting at a red light, and pointedly not looking at Kara. “You and Lena huh?”

Kara rolled her eyes. “You don’t get to judge me.”

“Oh honey,” Alex cast her a sideways glance. “Judging you is _not_ the thing I’m doing right now.”

“You’re being weird,” Kara looked out the passenger side window.

“So. Home?”

“Can you take me to L-Corp?”

“Goin’ to see your girlfriend?” Alex teased.

“Oh my God,” Kara put her hands over her face. “Can you not?”

“No.” Alex said. “I get to gush over my sister being in love with a nice person. I’m gonna give you an endless ration of shit for this.”

“I thought the point was to be nice.”

“Oh I’ll be really nice to Lena, who happens to be the object of your desires,” Alex cooed. The light turned green, and Alex pulled away. Alex hadn’t emerged from the last fight unscathed; her knuckles were scored badly. But still. She seemed unaffected.

“You are awful,” Kara said.

“Nah,” Alex said. She drove through the center of National City towards the tallest building there; L-Corp tower. It was mostly dark at this time of night. All except the top floor.

 “You want to take the elevator?”

“No.” Kara said. “I can get up there okay. It’s just sustained flight that’s hard.”

“You should’ve spent more time under the solar lamps.”

“No,” Kara shook her head again. “I’ll be okay when the sun comes up.”

Alex was accepting of her and Lena (Kara had been nervous about that) but how did Kara explain how badly she wanted to be by Lena’s side?

Kara didn’t have the words to explain how much she cared about Lena.

“Kara,” Alex’s voice was gentle. “How involved are you?”

Kara considered brushing it aside, trying to appease Alex’s protective fears, but she couldn’t. She slumped, in the passenger seat. “You remember, after we banished the Daxamites and beat Rhea and Lillian, what I told you?”

“Yeah. You were heartbroken.” Alex’s hand clenched around the wheel. “You should’ve kept the necklace.”

Kara looked at her hands. “I know.” An abyss opened inside her. It was another decision that ached, along a lifetime of moments where she didn’t have enough perspective to cope with what would come after she made a decision.

There hadn’t been anything right about that moment. He was leaving, and there was just an overwhelming feeling of how _wrong_ the departure was. It didn’t feel final, it didn’t feel like closure. It felt like abduction.

Like parts of her heart were being torn away and hurled into places she couldn’t reclaim them. So she faced him and tried to figure out a way to not feel broken despite how this was ending.

And she gave him the necklace. Her _mother’s_ necklace. She’d given it to Alex only once for safe-keeping and even then, she’d reclaimed it soon after.

And then he was gone. And she cried.

It took her so long to realize that she hadn’t cried for his departure. She’d cried because the weight of her mistakes broke her heart.

She’d done so much wrong. Forgiven too much, tried too hard, excused too much, and the final insult was the surrender of her one heirloom.

In the wake of that agony, a sort of enlightening bloomed.

She’d been hurt so much, she’d been broken in so many ways and so many times and she was in so much _pain_ and she fundamentally refused to hesitate again.

“I don’t know how to explain how I feel for Lena,” Kara’s voice was so soft. She didn’t know if Alex could even hear her. “There aren’t words big or important enough.”

“You’re the journalist, aren’t you?” Alex chided gently. “Find the words.”

“I can’t.” Kara looked at Alex. “It’s how you feel when Maggie isn’t by your side.”

Alex’s brows went up. “Wow.”

There was a ring on Alex’s third finger. Engagement.

Alex understood. She grinned. “Go get the girl. Bring her to the bar Thursday. Introduce her properly.”

Kara opened the door, and got out. She closed the door, tapped the side of the vehicle, and Alex drove away.

Kara took a deep breath, winced at the pain in her ribs, and leapt. She careened into the sky, arched up towards the top of L-Corp and found enough strength to fly the rest of the way.

She landed on Lena’s balcony too hard, stumbled, landed on hands and knees.

Despite that, she hadn’t made a lot of noise. She looked up. Lena was hunched over her desk, sleeping.

Kara’s heart ached with how much she loved Lena. Seeing her surrounded by tablets and blueprints and papers and her computer screen blazing with detailed engineering drawings. She was absolutely immersed in her work.

Saving the world. One business venture at a time.

On both her best, and worst days, Kara looked at Lena and wondered who the Supergirl actually was. Her or Lena.

Kara limped over to Lena’s desk, and knelt next to her. “Honey,” Kara whispered. She brushed her fingers over Lena’s arms.

Lena winced, opened her eyes, recoiled. Kara pulled her hand back. For a terrible moment, Lena’s bright green eyes looked around in panic and then settled on Kara’s face. She blinked once, twice, and then she relaxed. Her entire body relaxed, and she smiled at Kara with such quiet openness that Kara’s heart threatened to burst.

“I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“It’s okay,” Lena reached out, and brushed Kara’s hair back. “How are you?”

“Tired,” Kara confessed. “You worked late.”

“So did you.” She grinned at Kara.

Kara leaned in, Lena turned her chair, and met in the middle, lips first. Lena put her arms around Kara’s neck and held her tight. Kara slid her hands up Lena’s sides and up her shoulders and her neck and wound up in the thick, soft curls of Lena’s luscious hair.

Kara abandoned herself in the taste of Lena, the feel of Lena’s lips on hers, of the softness of her hair.

Lena intoxicated Kara. No one felt this way to hug, or kiss.

When she kissed Lena, the love songs made sense.

Lena drew her hands back and let them wander down Kara’s torso, over the edges of her breasts, to her sides and down and Kara hissed in pain as her hands brushed over her ribs.

Lena recoiled immediately, eyes frantic and focused, “Kara, are you hurt?”

Kara opened her mouth to reassure Lena, but for a terrible moment, Kara realized that there was _nothing_ she could get past Lena.

There were moments, pauses when Kara seemed to look at Lena, and look _through_ her, and realize that Lena was capable of keeping up with _anyone_ on Krypton.

“Yes,” Kara admitted.

Kara heard Lena’s heart accelerate but she kept her voice calm when she asked, “What measures do I need to take to treat you.”

“I don’t need the hospital, if that’s what you’re asking.” Kara grinned.

“Are you certain? I’ve got solar lamps here and at home and I can easily move them to your apartment if you’d rather recover there. Do you need any surgery? Bandages? Balms?”

Kara brushed Lena’s hair back. “Does it sound tacky if I just say I need you?”

Lena relaxed a little. “Sappy, maybe.”

“Okay then consider me sapped,” Kara grinned. “Though laying down under some sunlamps does seem like a good idea.”

“Where do you want to go?” Lena asked. “I can have takeout delivered.”

Lena’s hands were strong and sure on Kara’s shoulders and Kara let herself feel weak. “Can I ask you to decide?”

There was a pause, and Kara hesitated. Had she made a mistake? Was this too much to ask of Lena? They’d gotten hot and heavy in a hurry when they’d admitted their feelings for each other. It didn’t bother Kara initially; that was part of her new devotion to herself. She wanted Lena, and that was the beginning and end of it.

But there was more to this than there _ever_ was with Mon-El.

At no point in their relationship had Kara felt safe enough to ask him that. There was no moment when she trusted him as wholly as she trusts Lena in this moment. And the only reason Kara recognizes that is because of how she is with Lena.

You can’t recognize an absence of something you’ve never felt.

Kara _trusted_ Lena to take care of her, if she asked.

And now that she had, she was terrified that Lena might not—

“Can I take you home?”

“I’d like that.” Kara said.

“Come on,” Lena stood up, slowly, and helped Kara to her feet.

“Am I interrupting you?”

“Not really,” Lena said. “I mean. I’m always in the middle of something.”

She organized her desk briefly, darkened the tablets, and then reached out to take Kara’s hand. Though she still ached, the pain had receded greatly for being around Lena.

“Do you want to fly? Or are we taking my car?”

Kara considered. And then said, “Can we fly slowly? I can make it easily if we don’t push.”

“I appreciate how gung-ho you are,” Lena said, “But I also don’t want to be dropped.”

“Okay the only reason I almost dropped Winn _that one time_ was because he was trying to insist on the midriff uniform again. And that was like two years ago.”

Lena looked at her sideways, and Kara did not know what the look meant. And then Lena looked at Kara’s stomach, and Kara felt self-conscious.

“What?” Kara asked, her voice weak and childish.

“I’m interested to see what he had in mind.”

“No,” Kara wagged a finger at Lena. “I’m not changing my uniform.” She grabbed her cape and wrapped it around herself like a blanket. “I like my cape.”

“I wasn’t talking about a uniform other people would see.” Lena said, easily, and walked off towards the elevators.

It took Kara a moment to realize it, but when she did, she turned as red as her cape with blush.

How did Lena _do_ that! It wasn’t fair!

Kara followed her to the elevator, still limping. She’d wadded her knee on the landing earlier during the fight. She made a mental note; stop landing dramatically on one knee.

Lena held the elevator for her. Kara got on. “You’re mean, you know that?”

“What are the kids saying?” Lena looked at the top of the elevator, “I’m _thirsty_.”

Kara knew what she meant and she studiously did not look at Lena for fear of blushing ridiculously again. It didn’t work, and she blushed anyway. Lena brushed the back of her fingers over Kara’s cheek. “Honey, you’re burning up.” Lena teased.

“It’s your fault.”

“Oh really?” Lena giggled. “What did I do?”

“Don’t _do_ that,” Kara pleaded.

“Do what?” Lena tugged at Kara’s hand and drew it to her. Lena clasped Kara’s hand in bother of hers.

The elevator dinged on the garage on the ground floor. “Come on.”

Lena took them home.

In Kara’s parking space at her apartment building, Lena popped the trunk to her car, and got out. In the trunk was a heavy case laden with lights and power cables. Lena struggled to pick it up. Kara took it for her.

“Okay so when I said it’s easy to move, I meant, if you move it.”

“I noticed,” Kara grinned.

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Kara gestured. “Shall we?”

They went upstairs.

“You take a shower, “Lena said, once they were in Kara’s apartment. “I’ll set the lights up for when you’re done.”

“Okay.”

“Where do you want to rest?”

“My couch? Is that okay for you?”

“Sure!” Lena grinned. “It’ll be fine.”

Kara nodded, set the case down on her coffee table and went into her bedroom. She partially closed her door and stripped. She hung the uniform up and then took a shower.

The shower she lingered under. She only felt the water vaguely; when it stung at a still-healing cut, mostly, but still. It was nice to just stand there and decompress for a moment.

She stood under the water and drew herself in. She drew her senses into herself. She ignored the ambulance sirens six blocks away, the voices on the other sides of her walls, the laughter and crying and love. She pushed away the sense of everything, except for the heartbeat in the next room.

Lena’s heart was strong and steady and she focused on it with all her attention.

Listening to that, she didn’t want to listen to anything else.

She finished the shower, and dried off, and changed into baggy PJs. That done, she went into the living room. It was dark, except for two powerful sunlamps aimed down at the couch. Lena had shrugged out of her blazer and was now in the black tank top blouse she’d worn under it. She’d kicked her heels off, and tinkered quietly.

“Hey,” Kara said.

Lena looked up. “Hey yourself.” Lena lit up at the sight of Kara. Every time she looked at her, her entire demeanor changed. It made Kara drunk to see how she affected Lena.

It scared her a little, to see how profoundly Kara _did_ affect Lena. But she could only guess at what Lena saw when she looked at Kara.

She moved towards the couch. She limped.

Lena’s face crunched in concentration. “Honey,” Lena asked. “How badly did you get hurt today?”

Kara hesitated, but only briefly. “Bad.” She sighed, and told her everything. “There’s more kryptonite on earth than I thought. And there’s bad guys all over that are weaponizing it. Synthesizing it into different forms they can use in different ways.”

“How were you attacked tonight?”

“A gun that fired kryptonite bullets, and an alien with a kryptonite sword. Oddly,” Kara held her hand up as she realized, “The sword was not hard to deal with. The alien told me he was paid to attack me. It was the gunman that made life difficult.”

“The bullets hurt you?”

“Yeah. A lot.”

Lena tried not to look concerned and failed.

“I’m okay,” Kara assured her. “Promise.”

“Um. Okay.” Lena looked away. “Do you need anything else from me? I ordered food, it should be here in ten minutes or so, and then you don’t have to move until you’re better.”

“Lena, what’s wrong?”

“I have work to do.” Lena said, and then hesitated, closed her eyes, took a breath. “That came out really mean.”

“Lena,” Kara reached for her, but Lena was stiff now, unmoving. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Lena lied. Lena was an exceptional liar but until this point, she’d never tried to lie to Kara.

Kara squinted. She didn’t know what she do. Should she push? Ask deeper questions? Try and get a more straightforward answer out of Lena?

She had no idea.

“Lena, what did I say?”

Lena hesitated, and then slumped. “Nothing. It’s not you.”

“Please don’t hide from me.” Kara pleaded. “You’re right in front of me, but you’re not here.”

Kara hadn’t meant to sound that desperate. And yet, there she was.

Lena considered, “Um. It’s part of a project I’m working on.”

“Is it classified?”

“From the government, yes. Because they were the ones who commissioned Luthor-Corp to weaponized kryptonite.”

Kara’s heart stopped. “You’re weaponizing kryptonite?”

“No,” Lena’s voice was calm. “My brother was. When I took over, I trashed those commissions. I won’t be party to genocide.” Her voice got heated in a heartbeat and Lena took a moment to calm down. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you.”

“Lena,” Kara begged. “Please. Tell me what’s wrong?”

“I have a pet project,” Lena’s words tumbled out of her in a hurry, “I was synthesizing an antidote for Kryptonite. Something stronger than just exposure to solar light.”

Kara had no words, her jaw came open, and Lena misinterpreted this and she continued in a rush, “It’s not perfect but it’s a step for me! It’s progress towards the bigger goal, I promise!”

“Lena—“

“I’m trying, Kara, I mean it, I’m not trying to make weapons I’m trying to make you immune to weapons.”

Kara’s mind stopped dead, “What?”

“I’m trying to find a way to make you immune to kryptonite.” Lena deflated. “I don’t know how else to protect you.” She looked at her hands. “I’m so scared, Kara. You’re bullet proof and you’re invulnerable but I see you get hurt so often by this one silly little rock and I don’t know how to protect you from it. I just want to keep you safe. You look out for the city and I wanted to look out for you.”

Kara’s heart managed to break, and grow, and be so full of love in the same moment that all Kara could do was draw Lena into her arms and hold her tight. She whispered into Lena’s ear, “I love you. I love you so much.”

Lena cried a laugh, “I love you too.”

“I didn’t know you were trying.”

“I wanted to surprise you. Make it a gift.”

“Surprise,” Kara imitated. “I found a way for you to be immune to the one thing that can kill you.”

“Essentially. But I’m struggling with the xenobiology.”

Kara had an idea. A big, explosive idea.

“Look,” Kara said. “I need to ask you something, okay? It’s important and it’s a big deal for our relationship but. Um. Would you go for drinks with me Thursday night? I want to introduce you to the DEO crew. Officially.”

“But they know me.”

“Yes,” Kara rolled her eyes, “As Lena Luthor; the smartest girl on planet earth.”

Lena blushed fiercely and Kara savored the visual.

“I want to introduce you as Lena Luthor; my girlfriend.”

Lena met Kara’s eyes and her jaw hung loose for a moment, “You mean that?”

“I do. I want them to see how happy you make me.”

“If you’re comfortable with it, then I’d love to.”

“My mom will be there.”

“Eliza?”

“Yeah. She’s a scientist. And I think she might be able to help you with your xenobiology issue. Since, you know. She raised xenobiology.”

Lena was a whirlwind of eager words, “I’d love to! Oh wow okay um I hadn’t planned for a new partner but I know _of_ Eliza Danvers, she’s brilliant, like, her work on sequencing the white martian genome is legendary, okay, I’ll have to organize my notes and—“

“Honey,” Kara brushed her fingers over Lena’s jaw. “You can do it tomorrow.”

Lena’s manic energy grounded slowly and she looked at Kara and after a long moment, she nodded. “Yeah. Okay.”

“Cuddle with me?” Kara asked.

The doorbell rang.

“Food first,” Lena said. “I even overlooked this opportunity for me to inflict healthy food on you and got you potstickers.”

“Oh you hero,” Kara squeaked. Lena got the door, dealt with the order, and closed the door.

“Let’s eat. Then cuddle. Okay?”

“Sounds like a plan.” Kara said.

She watched her girlfriend organize two plates of food for them out of the takeout, and Kara was lost in the bliss of the moment.

This almost made up for everything. Having Lena here, being domestic like this. It healed her heart more than any amount of time, distance, or solar lamps could ever hope to manage.

 

 

THE END

**Author's Note:**

> welp.


End file.
